


my hands no longer an afterthought

by shatteredhourglass



Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Cabin Fic, Clint Barton is a Mess, Getting Back Together, Holidays, Hurt Clint Barton, M/M, Minor Injuries, POV Bucky Barnes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:34:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28129236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shatteredhourglass/pseuds/shatteredhourglass
Summary: Bucky's moving on with his life. Shaking off the Soldier.There's still that one nagging, blond idiot-shaped regret, though.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton
Comments: 68
Kudos: 282
Collections: Winterhawk Wonderland - 2020 edition!





	my hands no longer an afterthought

**Author's Note:**

  * For [pietray](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pietray/gifts).



> A gift! I hope it's everything you hoped it would be. I tried to put in all three prompts this time - they were so much fun that I had a mighty need to combine them, and I just hope I've done them justice. 
> 
> Title taken from one of the prompts; Richard Siken's Little Beast. In all honesty, I don't read poetry most of the time, but I did enjoy this one. Now I am more cultured. Happy holidays, folks.

“I’m leaving,” Bucky tells Steve, sometime in October when the chill starts to settle in his bones.

Steve doesn’t exactly _agree_ with the decision, but Steve doesn’t get a choice in the matter.

Bucky packs up his possessions - of which there are very few, because most of his stuff is just Steve’s stuff anyway and that’s part of the _problem_ \- and then he finds the closest bus station and sits himself down right at the back where he can survey the people coming in and out.

No one talks to him except for the elderly bus driver, who asks him where he’s headed. _Away_ feels like the only correct answer he can give, and she gives him a kind smile before she drops him off at her last stop for the night. It’s a small town. Bucky sits in the tiny bus shelter and waits.

The bus driver must call someone, because an hour or two later there’s a young girl who delivers him a cup of soup and won’t accept compensation. Bucky thanks her, ignoring the way her eyes go wide when she sees his shiny metal fingers, and drinks the soup.

It’s good.

Then he gets on the next bus and keeps going.

There’s a lot of reasons to get out of Avengers Tower.

Bucky needs the peace, he reasons with himself.

The public doesn’t trust him, and there’s a million articles about Russian infiltration in the Avengers. It’s in the middle of Manhattan and the crowds always give him anxiety. He keeps hiding at least five knives on his person and he nearly stabbed Sam that one time. Steve’s suffocating him with all the pitying looks and tentative voice. Hydra keep trying to snatch him when he goes to Starbucks.

None of that stops him from feeling a little empty when he dumps his duffel bag in the doorway of an empty log cabin in the middle of buttfuck nowhere, Canada.

It’s what he’s working with, though.

It’s something.

He takes a deep breath and forces himself into action.

Bucky works on it.

He finds clothes that aren’t black or bulletproof - picks out soft flannel shirts and pale sweatpants, greys and whites and greens and blues - and throws out anything that reminds him of the Soldier. Even his boots are traded out for shoes that are a little less weather-appropriate but ultimately comforting, and he feels good about it.

The knives go as well, as do the guns (it takes him a few tries and several panic attacks before he takes them somewhere to be taken apart safely, but he does it.) He cuts his hair with one of the knives before he throws it in the trash, leaves it messy and choppy over his forehead because he doesn’t care as long as it’s _different_.

Bucky doesn’t recognize himself in the mirror.

Or he _does_ , but he’s so used to seeing the broken husk of Soldier that it takes him a moment to realize he’s looking at Bucky Barnes. His hair looks so fucking _stupid_. He kind of loves it.

Furnishing the cabin takes up most of November.

Bucky doesn’t actually know _how_ to furnish a cabin, but after the third day of standing blankly in the nearest furniture store, the woman running the place takes pity on him and walks him through the things he probably needs if he doesn’t want to live in an empty box for the next however-long.

(A _bed_ , how did he not realize he needed a bed?)

He manages the essentials with some help - a bedframe, a table with two chairs, a mattress and a set of sheets with tiny yellow flowers printed on them. After that he gets a little more comfortable with the idea of making his own space and adds a small bookshelf, a radio, and a pair of lamps that emit gentle golden light.

The local librarian is more than happy to recommend his favourite books and Bucky takes them all. It’s like he rediscovers tiny pieces of himself in each turn of the pages, eagerly following each adventure and misadventure until he remembers - yes, he’s been to that place in Germany they’re describing, and he remembers the first time he’d looked at a man and thought _yes_.

An elderly florist asks him for help one day when their car breaks down and somehow it turns into Bucky spending each Monday sorting hydrangeas from hyacinths (free of charge - they try to slip money into his pocket, but he returns it every time and instead takes a tulip to put in a vase by the window.)

The world shifts.

Sometime in December he goes from being the Winter Soldier, Fist of Hydra, to being handy old Bucky-down-the-road that hosts Friday’s book club and helps out everyone’s grandparents and takes in that one kitten that keeps getting in the hole in Mrs Jack’s roof.

(He names the cat Alpine, and tries not to look at the television in Mrs Jack’s living room proudly proclaiming that the Avengers have saved the day yet again. Alpine becomes a good distraction, especially when she decides it’s her god-given right to destroy the entire house.)

It’s making him feel some kind of way, and it takes him a while to realize it’s _peace_.

Carmen’s insisting they read some poetry for book club as well as prose, so Bucky’s spending his Christmas eve curled up on his brand-new couch trying to comprehend Richard Silken’s finest with a mug of spiked eggnog. He’s managed to get an old gas heater working and it’s keeping him cozy enough that he’s half-asleep as his eyes drag sluggishly over the words.

Going to bed in the early evening seems a little silly, even if he is technically the second-oldest person in this town. (Mrs Jack moves faster than he does. Old ladies are made of something else.) Bucky tries to keep his attention on the page even as his mind wanders, skimming the words without really taking them in.

_I wanted to take him home_ _,_ _  
_ _and rough him up and get my hands inside him, drive my body into his_ __  
_like a crash test car._ _  
_ _I wanted to be wanted and he was_ _-_

Bucky’s mind abruptly turns to messy blond hair and a knowing smile. He starts remembering calloused hands gently taking the gun from his numb fingers and stories about the circus at three in the morning, and lips on his, and-

-he closes the book.

His breathing is louder than it should be, harsh against the low hum of the heater.

It’s not the time to think about that.

_Tap._

Maybe he will go to bed after all. He’s spent most of the day shoveling snow for the old folks who can’t quite manage it themselves and it’s left him a little cold and distracted. It didn’t help that Marjorie asked him to set up targets for her youngest grandchild, who’s started learning archery.

That’s probably what’s got his mind wandering. Tomorrow he’s going to throw himself into cleaning and forget all about it.

_Tap_.

Bucky looks up.

_Tap tap tap_.

It’s too rhythmic to be the wind, and as he thinks that the tuneless tapping turns into a rendition of a song he’s pretty sure was on the radio a few days ago. Who’d need him at this hour? He’d bought a landline phone _specifically_ so the older residents wouldn’t come trekking out into his neck of the woods in the middle of the night.

He sets the book aside as the knocking slows down. By the time he’s gotten off the couch and reached the front door it’s gone silent, and for a moment he thinks he was imagining it.

But as he opens the door and sees a snow-covered purple shape sitting slumped on the steps, he freezes on the spot. Surely he’s not _off_ enough to start hallucinating things. If he’s not imagining it, though, that means that-

“ _Clint?_ ”

The figure turns their head and sure enough, it’s _his_ Hawkeye (for a second he’d hoped Kate Bishop had just gotten tall), exactly as Bucky remembers him. Or _nearly_ exactly - Bucky doesn’t remember the split lip or the ripped tux but he remembers the worried little crease of his eyebrows, the haphazard hairstyle and the bow tucked over his back.

“Heya, Buck,” Clint says. “Merry Christmas.”

Bucky nearly shuts the door on him.

He doesn’t, he _can't_ , but he thinks about it.

“Nice place,” Clint remarks when Bucky gestures him inside, dropping down into a chair.

“Ha ha,” Bucky says dryly.

“I wasn’t joking,” Clint responds. “It’s… cozy.”

Bucky doesn’t bother with the usual questions - how’d he get out here, why he’s here in the first place, what he wants. Whether anyone sent him. Knowing Clint, he’ll either avoid the questions or give Bucky a stupid answer to distract him because if there’s one thing Clint hates, it’s serious conversations, especially if he thinks Bucky won’t like the answers.

Instead he pulls out the half-empty bottle of brandy and upends it into his mug, not bothering with the eggnog this time. He gets a raised eyebrow for the action and ignores it, dropping into the chair next to Clint and offering what’s left in the bottle.

Clint accepts it, takes a swig. “No Christmas tree?”

“Plenty of trees outside,” Bucky replies.

“Fair enough.”

They sit in silence together, right up until Bucky runs out of patience waiting for Clint to give him something to work with.

“I’m not going back.”

“Wasn’t going to ask you to go back,” Clint says, taking another mouthful of brandy. “You think _I’d_ be the one to force you to do anything you don’t want to do, out of everyone in that team? After everything?”

Fair. “Sorry. I wasn’t expecting…”

“Me showing up on your doorstep? Yeah, I got that. Sorry I didn’t bring a present - I was on-mission nearby, thought I’d…” Clint waves a hand, looking lost for a moment. “I dunno, it wasn’t planned. I just ended up here. You know when your brain goes on autopilot for a while and then you’re somewhere with no recollection of how you got there in the first place?”

Bucky’s distracted from what his rambling by the flash of red on his hand. It looks _fresh_ , and suddenly Bucky realizes how pale Clint is, the way he’d hunched in on himself when he’d walked in like it hurt to straighten up, how he’s been angling his left side out of Bucky’s line of sight.

“Are you hurt?”

“What? Oh, it’s nothing,” Clint replies, faux-casual, and now Bucky’s looking he can see the slight grimace, what looks like makeshift bandages under his unbuttoned shirt. “You know what bad guys are like with their guns. They only clipped me a little.”

“You got _shot?_ ”

“Your couch is yellow,” Clint says.

Bucky supposes it is yellow. Mrs Jack had insisted it was ‘canary,’ but he’s fairly sure that was a roundabout way of saying it’s yellow anyway. He likes it. Nothing wrong with a bit of yellow, especially when it’s so comfortable.

Clint’s distracting him.

“Fuck’s sake, Barton,” Bucky says, exasperated. “How bad is it?”

“Not that bad.”

That’s his lying voice.

Bucky narrows his eyes.

“Not life-threatening,” Clint amends. “Promise I won’t die in your nice new house. Don’t worry about it.”

That’s the least of Bucky’s problems right now. He gets up from his seat, pulls off his white cardigan so he doesn’t get anything on it and rolls up his sleeves. “I’ll decide if I want to worry about it or not once you let me see. Take your jacket off. And the shirt.”

“Jeez, Buck, you sure are a sweet talker,” Clint says. He winces halfway through getting the jacket off and Bucky sighs and reaches over to help.

Underneath, the left side of his shirt is soaked through with blood. Bucky resists the urge to recoil from it. Instead he takes a deep breath and focuses on helping Clint get it off without making it worse, carefully peeling the cotton away from the injury.

“You’re hopeless,” Bucky says.

It comes out softer, _fonder_ than he’d like it to.

“Yeah,” Clint answers tiredly, not even trying to argue with him.

The shot’s not as bad as he’d thought it was, judging from the blood. Clint was right; it’s only a graze - albeit a nasty one, but still a graze nonetheless. He’s had worse before. No bullets to pull out, thankfully, although he averts his eyes from the Glock tucked in Clint’s waistband.

“Stay,” he says, gets up to grab the first-aid kit.

Clint does stay, and when Bucky exits the bathroom he stops for a second just to look. Clint hasn’t noticed him yet and he’s looking out the window at the snow falling, something dark and tense in his eyes. His face is lit by the orange glow of the nearby lamp, surrounded by flowers and poetry, and it’s obvious how much he doesn’t fit in with the rest of this scene.

He’s still kind of beautiful, though.

“Sit sideways,” Bucky says. “It’ll be easier for me to patch it up.”

Clint moves without verbally acknowledging him, shifting on the chair. He doesn’t quite look at Bucky and Bucky wonders if he’s had the same thought about how not-so-different this is from what they’d had before.

He waits Clint out this time - focuses on cleaning the worst of the dried blood from his side, cuts a piece of gauze so it’s the right size. He doesn’t have any painkillers because it’s not like he needs them, but he feels bad even though Clint doesn’t so much as flinch at his touch.

Some of the red won’t come off and he touches his fingers to it before he realizes it’s part of a tattoo. The bullet graze has taken most of the image with it but he can see the sharp red edges, already knows what it is because he sees it every day in the mirror.

“You didn’t say goodbye,” Clint says.

Bucky looks up at his face. “I didn’t realize I needed to.”

“You don’t. I’m sorry,” Clint says, looking away. “I know this is too much - my self-control is fucking _shit_ , but I should’ve known better than to show up here when you’re trying to get out of all this stuff-”

Clint goes to get up - overbalances, nearly falls on his ass until Bucky catches him and gently guides him back down into the chair. He doesn’t meet Bucky’s gaze but there’s something torn in his expression as he grabs for the brandy instead, tries to tip it up to his face only to find it’s empty.

“You were the only thing I liked about being there,” Bucky confesses when Clint puts the bottle down.

“I - what?”

“I almost stayed just for you. Just because of that one kiss,” Bucky admits.

It would’ve been wrong for him to stay for that. Selfish, or maybe not selfish enough. He’s not enough of a romantic to think it would’ve fixed him. He’d still spent a lot of time thinking about the brush of Clint’s lips against his, the soft little smile on his face when he’d pulled back and tucked a strand of Bucky’s hair behind his ear.

Clint looks lost at that. Whatever his reply is, it gets cut off by the appearance of Bucky’s cat, who’s decided to strut across the table and stick her chubby little face under Clint’s hand.

“Get off the table, you brat,” Bucky says.

She ignores him. Clint doesn’t help matters, shifting the hand so he can scritch under her chin. She lets out an approving noise and Clint’s tiny answering smile is equally beautiful and heart-breaking.

“I get it,” Clint says. “I get why you had to leave but _fuck_ , Bucky, it hurt. I thought it was my fault.”

“It was, a little bit. You made me realize it was okay to be a person,” Bucky says.

“Jesus fuck,” Clint says, and it comes out rough and desperate.

Bucky’s not quite expecting it when Clint leans up to kiss him but he leans into it anyway, lets his eyes fall closed as he tastes the blood on Clint’s mouth. It’s not the best kiss he’s ever had - it’s Clint, though, so he can’t make himself mind.

“I missed you so much,” Clint says, muffled against his mouth.

“Figured you were into the Winter Soldier thing,” Bucky murmurs.

“I am,” Clint answers, honest. “I was. But I’m into the _you_ thing, mostly. I like this version too. You seem… more settled, maybe. Comfortable. You have a cat.”

“I have a cat,” Bucky agrees, watching Clint’s bandaged fingers stroke over Alpine’s tiny head.

“This is a lot,” Clint says. “It’s- I’m happy for you.”

“You’re not staying,” Bucky says. It’s not a question.

“Still a superhero. Got a job to do. Also, I crashed a car into someone’s fence and I have to go back and apologize,” Clint says. He looks unsure for a second, and then speaks again. “I could… come back, though? If you want me to.”

“I’d like that,” Bucky responds before he can second-guess himself. It’s worth it for the look on Clint’s face, and it’s definitely worth it for the way Clint leans in to press a feather-light kiss to his cheek so he can feel the smile pressed to his skin. Maybe he can get a little greedy about this new life he’s got.

It’s worth it.


End file.
